Ah, yes. But while the Duchy of Lancaster has merged with the Crown and so Duke of Lancaster is a style to which she is entitled (and that is still used on some occasions in Lancaster), it is not part of her official style and title as Queen. Ditto with all of her honours (Garter, Thistle, Bath, etc.)

(Lancaster differs from Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man as the latter three are not part of the United Kingdom, but rather are Crown Dependencies.)


And then there's the whole issue of her style and title in Scotland. http://forums.sidc.co.uk/public/styl...ey-flag006.gif

This looks like the best place to put this:
http://www.theonion.com/articles/cut...t-of-me,30602/

Also, I'm really enjoying learning about all this, of which I have only the vaguest idea. I believe if/when Wills gets the throne he will be the first direct descendent of Charles II to do so? (I think I brought this up around the time of the wedding, but it was a long time ago, and I don't have a lot of trivia to spout off so I have to keep reusing.)

And by far the most hilarious/tongue-in-cheek names I've seen for the couple is Bill & Cathy Cambridge.

Ha!

I think if it's a boy they should name him Keith and if it's a girl, Brenda.



(20 points to anyone who gets the joke.)

I think Cheryl sounds way better than Brenda.

Ding! Ding! We have a winner!


Cheryl does sound better, but do they really need another Cheryl? I'd probably avoid Brian, too.

http://m.usmag.com/?redirurl=/celebr...advice-2012412

Snooki giving advice to Kate?!?!? Really????

The world IS ending soon!!!!!

BG

So apparently Buckingham Palace didn't even know Kate was pregnant when she was being admitted to the hospital for morning sickness. I wonder how long they would have kept the pregnancy a secret had there been no complications?

I wouldn't be surprised if they had planned to hide it until she became obvious she was pregnant. Honestly I probably would have done the same thing. As far as I am concerned they are entitled to the same right to privacy as the average person. There is absolutely no political reason they needed to hurry because William isn't even the Prince of Wales.

Standard protocol is 12 weeks, when the largest threat of miscarriage has passed. Besides, if you've ever dealt with someone who felt the need to share the fact that they were pregnant the moment they peed on a stick the morning after the comingling of baby making fluids, 9 months of it is a LONG time. If I were them, I'd have held out until lying about weight gain was ridiculous. But her being hospitalized without telling could have easily turned into some horrible rumors about abortion and all kinds of other nonsense, so they were really stuck. The British tabloid press is relentless and cruel.

When I was pregnant with my twins, I was very sick. It lasted until the 6-7 month. BTW, I didn't have an ultrasound until 7 months. Surprise Twins!


With my first, I had the usual morning sickness that ended after the first trimester. My sister, had what Kate appears to have and spent a good portion of her pregnancy in and out of the hospital. For that reason, she only had the one child. I hope she (Kate) doesn't have to spend her pregnancy in the hospital. Although, that might keep the photographers away from her.

At the time of her birth, she was styled The Honourable Diana Spencer as daughter of John Spencer (Viscount Althorp) and the granddaughter of Albert Spencer, 7th Earl Spencer.

She became Lady Diana Spencer at the time of her grandfather's death, when her father inherited the title John Spencer, 8th Earl Spencer.

No, it is technically true.

"Commoner" is commonly (no pun intended) used to mean something along the lines of "someone who is a member of a noble or aristocratic family." But in Britain, it legally (technically) means anyone who is not sovereign, not royalty (meaning the consort or child of the sovereign, a grandchild through a son of the sovereign, or the eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales), and not a peer. While in continental Europe, the families of the nobility were themselves considered noble, that is not the case in Britain. A duke or earl is noble, but members of his family are all legally commoners, even if no one thinks of them that way. Courtesy titles do not make one noble; only substantive titles do.

I don't think it's a slam to say that Diana was a commoner, or that Kate is. After all, two of the Queen's grandchildren -- Peter and Zara Phillips -- are also commoners (and would be even if their father had been made a peer).

I stand corrected.

As an obstetrician, ridiculously early pregnancy announcements are a pet peeve of mine. Most of the people I work with wait to announce until after everything checks out okay at their 20-week ultrasound. I get that this is a unique situation, however.

I get 20 points!

Does Britian have a HIPPA like privacy law? This nurse better hope not.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/p...-call/1747619/

This story has now taken a surprising and sad turn:

http://gma.yahoo.com/nurse-hoaxed-qu...opstories.html

Yikes! Very sad.

This really gets me:

Really? They apologize for "any inconveniences" and are sorry if they caused "any issues"? How about actually taking real responsibility and apologizing for your actions and your lack of judgment? :rolleyes:

Am I the only one who is interested (and hoping!) in whether or not that poor nurse died a natural death?


And now it's reported that she committed suicide: Nurse radio hosts pranked to get royal baby details commits suicide.

I believe that the radio station can expect a lawsuit from this woman's family in the near future.

I've got mixed feelings about this...

When it was reported that the nurse released information, the nurse was the one who was being side-eyed for her lack of judgement. But when a nurse (who didn't reveal info) commits suicide, it's the radio station who is now being criticized.

I certainly think it was a mistake for the deejays to make the prank call, and I suspect they will be reprimanded/punished by the radio station if they haven't already. But it doesn't seem entirely appropriate to me that the radio station would face a lawsuit. Perhaps that's just my personal feelings toward those who commit suicide coloring my judgement here, but the radio station couldn't have foreseen her reaction. Should the deejays be fired? Sure, I can see that. The radio station is accountable for poor decisions made by its employees, and terminating said employees is reasonable. But to hold the radio station accountable for a woman's suicide seems a bit much.

I dunno, I think it is definitely foreseeable that duping a hospital nurse into releasing information about a royal patient could cause severe emotional distress and that could lead to suicide.

I'll bet there's some wonderful Queen's Bench law covering the matter, but my Westlaw account doesn't have that in my plan.

It's not the first time the radio station has been in trouble:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slate..._fm_prank.html
QUOTE:
It's worth pointing out, however, that this isn't the first time that 2Day FM has run into trouble with a prank. The station was slapped with a five-year license probation back in 2009 for violating Australian regulations after a gag involving a lie detector went horribly wrong, ending with a 14-year-old girl admitting on air that she was raped. (The Daily Beast has more on that story here.)

For the record, found this on reddit: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20645838

Apparently lots of other media outlets (Fox, per the link above and Huffingtonpost, in another story I saw) are not being very clear. The nurse that was found dead is not the nurse who revealed the info. From the article:

"Mrs Saldanha, a duty nurse who was married with two children, answered the telephone because it was 05:30 GMT and there was no receptionist on duty...In the call, another nurse was tricked into revealing specific confidential information about the duchess's medical condition."

Except that the nurse who committed suicide wasn't the same nurse who released information.
*(ETA that I'm not trying to justify the deejays' actions. Just that the nurse who seems to be facing the bigger issues here is the one who released the info, not the one who transferred the call.)
**[EATA that it likely doesn't matter which deceived nurse committed suicide. If it's foreseeable that the one who released information would commit suicide, then it's also foreseeable that the one who transferred the call would commit suicide. See what I mean about having mixed feelings? I shouldn't have posted in this thread until I figured out where I stood on the issue.]

When I first heard of the nurse's death, before it was identified as suicide, I wondered if the nurse who released information got mad at the nurse who transferred the call and subsequently killed her.

It's a shame though, all the way around. The nurse who released info made poor decisions, the deejays made poor decisions, the nurse who committed suicide made poor decisions... such negativity surrounding what should be a celebratory event (that an heir is on the way, not Kate's hospitalization).

I thought this was a very good editorial on Ethics, from The Toronto Star:

"Blaming DJs for nurse’s death simplistic and vindictive"

And I'm in agreement with that guy.

Tick, tock, tick, tock . . . .

::yawn::

Am I the only person who doesn't care about this?

No. I honestly wish everybody would leave them alone. It would be one thing if it was the first child of the King, but we are talking about the Heir of the Heir having a child.

It is possible -- theoretically, at least -- to give them their privacy and still be interested and have some anticipation. I don't know how things are on the ground in Britain, but the coverage hasn't seemed nearly as overboard as what's sometimes been seen in the past.

My husband could care less, but I'm really excited for the royal birth.

I was hoping it would be on our dog's birthday (July 13), since he is a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel with English bloodlines and a fabulous pedigree. That would have been fitting.

My husband rolled his eyes at that.

Any bets on the name?

I'm on record for James (if it's a boy) or Alexandra (if it's a boy), but hoping that Diana & Elizabeth are included in a girl's name.

I'm doubting James, only because of Hewitt, and the fact that the Earl of Wessex's son is also named James. I think Alexandra would be lovely, the DoK's sister is one of my favourite royals!

What about Andrew, for the University where they met?

There's a story on Yahoo! that The DoC is being helicoptered to London, supposedly to go the hospital!

Well I am very excited about it! I think it is so romantic! I think it's going to be a girl and her name will be Victoria Diana.

+1

One can only hope.

I would only assume that if it's a girl Diana will be in there somewhere. And possibly Elizabeth. I am sure it will be traditional. Boys could be less traditional, if they want to honor his mother the son could always be named Spencer (her maiden name).